Blog 5, an opinion of digital film.

     Films play a huge role in society. The theatre was a way to escape reality or to get enveloped by the film. For example the great depression was a boom for films, the theatres still ran movies and people still went, even though their circumstances. In these times film was cherished, you saw a film as something more than just entertainment; it was something that took over and hit a nerve. Thus the film became more than just a movie, it became a piece of art targeting emotion and thought. Film progresses through history, even though it is somewhat a short history, changing constantly and creating new innovating ideas that overcome the film industry. Silent films to talkies, growth of studios and the golden age of Hollywood, film noir, epics, death of the studio and rise of the independent film, the new wave, and today the rise of digital film and computer generated special effects. The raw essentials of old film making and its way of capturing the perfect shot and finding the visual trigger to strike an emotion has become muffled by the overwhelming blockbuster. Digital has brought to the stand a new way to create whatever is wanted, and the industry tries so hard to create real, when real is right in front of them.

    Creating a blockbuster is trying to get a sense of awe and also a large crowed to the theatre. The film industry is trying to make money by using a style of big, luring, and grandiose filmmaking that harnesses a sense of amazement. But the sense of capturing beauty or emotion gets lost in all of the excitement. Digital films and special effects are just adding to the growth of the blockbuster. Money is the greatest concern within the film industry. The use of film as an art is rarely seen in theatres; a beautifully made film cannot be made for the sole desire of making money, but instead it needs to capture something that provokes a thought. A film needs to be sublime, something that catches the attention of a viewer in a way other than the exciting blockbuster.

     Film has become a money making dazzling lightshow that is aspiring to become bigger and bigger. It all comes down to what makes the money. It is these kinds of films that have taken over. Our society has a lust to be dazzled rather than being pried open emotionally and being moved by a film. So therefore we see an enormously mystifying demand for the extravagant blockbuster. And because of the digital age, the average person can, download, copy, steal, store, and watch any film they desire. Oddly, it is the blockbusters that create the uproar. Only within a certain community of people the use of film as an art form is harnessed. And in the case of this group the digital age has created a new style of artists that have become the innovators for a new era of film. So in the end, digital is just a new chapter in the book, and it is still being used by a select few to create magnificent, art. It is the artist that needs to be appreciated rather than the moneymaker.